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Show Chairman McNutt of the Man- power Commission will determine which of these workers are essential essen-tial to war work and subject to draft deferment. While not complete, com-plete, the list includes: Diemakers, jobsetters, machinists, machin-ists, toolmakers, ship fitters, ship carpenters, ship electricians, aircraft air-craft sheet metal workers, surface grinder operators, tool grinder operators, op-erators, boring mill operators, engine en-gine lathe operators, turret lathe operators, and irreplaceable farmers. JameS Preston As major struggles rage on eight world battlefronts, Washington tighten the reins on production to provide maximum quantity of planes and tanks for a long death struggle with totalitarianism. Manufacturers Man-ufacturers unable to convert to war production will go out of business or conform to a rigid wartime pattern pat-tern to provide the bare necessities necessi-ties of civilian life. OPA, talking standardization of all manufactured goods, would outlaw out-law new models. Uniform products would lead to uniform prices, tend to curb Inflation, maintain price ceilings save materials. Already approximately 1,800,000 articles are under price regulations regula-tions and OPA looks for more effective ef-fective price enforcement through a reduction of this number. During World War I, about 15 per cent of U. S. industry was engaged en-gaged in war production at its peak. The end of 1942 is expected to see 70 per cent concentrating on war materials. To keep this huge industrial machine operating at capacity the 10 million workers now employed by war plants will be more than doubled. Regulations soon to be issued by Essential industries so far specified speci-fied include: Aircraft, shipbuilding, ordnance and accessories, ammunition, firearms, fire-arms, explosives, power boilers, scientific instruments, wood distillation, distil-lation, naval stores, iron, steel, porous foundry products, poultry and dairy farming, sugar beet production, pro-duction, and food processing. Stabilization of wages, one of the seven points of President Roosevelt's Roose-velt's anti-inflation program, has been pushed to the front by the Little Steel case. While the war labor board is in continuous session ses-sion on this matter, its decision, looked for daily, is not expected to settle the controversy. Key administration officials are working on a permanent plan to define dollar and cents wage standards stan-dards to be followed by WLB. This would fix a level of wages above which increases would not be permitted. While the wage scale has not been announced, it is known to be high. Few in Washington believe it will go lower than $36.65 a week, the average factory wage for April, 1941. In addition to difference of opinion opin-ion on the wage level, Capitol Hill and the executive branch also lock horns on the House slashing of OPA's H enderson's appropriation from 161 million dollars to 75 million mil-lion dollars, the House Ways and Means committee's flat refusal to vote a tax bill of $8,650,000,000, and the refusal of both congressional congres-sional bodies to fall in line with the administration's plan for price- fixing and marketing: of farm products. pro-ducts. There are some members on Capitol Hill who believe wage stabilization sta-bilization is the cause of the whole controversy and these have the opinion that labor union leaders will never agree voluntarily on this issue as it would weaken their control con-trol over union members. |
